On fear.

A couple of weeks ago, my mom was hospitalized with severe stomach pain. The doctors were worried, thinking it was an infection, and I looked at flights to Tennessee

There's a clarity that comes with real fear, for yourself, for your family or loved ones. We wear our fragility like the Emperor' new clothes. We don't even notice it unless someone or something points it out, and then we become shocked, embarrassed at our nakedness.

I'm very lucky here. I know that. I'm happy with the life I've built in Boston. But when I say I love my job or that I love this city, it may be true, but it's true only to a point. Love comes in degrees. And I was ready to hop on a plane.

I don't think it would surprise anyone who knows me if I said I was and have always been a mama's boy. I feel no shame in saying that, because if you had a mother like mine, you'd be a mama's boy or girl too.

What openness I have in my heart is directly from her. When I was young, we read together folktales and myths from Asia, Africa, America, and Europe. And from her, though I never gained a single system of belief, I learned that all beliefs can be beautiful, that all of the ways people try to make sense of a world that can be cruel and harsh and absurd, carry with them their own depth, their own hurt and beauty.

I liked Coyote from Native American tales and Br'er Rabbit from Uncle Remus, Loki and Prometheus of Norse and Greek mythology. I liked figures who were always a step ahead, who understood where the chips were going to fall and who seemed to outwit not only the other characters but the world at large. It is no coincidence that these sorts of characters are the fire bringers, the ones who take nature's ultimate symbol of chaos and transform it into humanity's symbol of innovation, creativity, and control.

In "Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself," which is an extended essay and interview with David Foster Wallace, there's a part that describes Wallace and Jonathan Franzen discussing the purpose of fiction, and they decide finally that it is to stave off loneliness. I would go a step further and say that writing, the creation of narrative, is there to stave off death.

It allows us to give meaning and understanding to all the things we cannot control. We all get the phone calls we don't want. We each come to a point where we are forced to understand the tiers of our lives and the order of our loves. I am very lucky, and very happy to say that my mother is feeling better. What ailment she had seems to have passed over two nights in a hospital bed. She is home. She is well. And I am in Boston, still a little scared, still, when I think about it, sad.

But I tell stories. That is what I do. And though I know doing that will never truly control what I fear, that it will never keep everyone I love safe, I can hope that occasionally the attempt is beautiful. And maybe that's enough.

Reading Moby Dick

While riding the train to and from Washington, DC, last weekend there were a lot of things that distracted me from reading; the amazing and weird scenery, the snack car, people yakking on cell phones around us, breaking my sunglasses, the train breaking down. I held Moby Dick in my lap for quite awhile before I cracked it open. And then I found it hard to concentrate and kept reading the same sentences over and over thinking, what is this guy talking about? I need a dictionary. I remembered the enthusiastic Melville customer from a couple of weeks back who had told me to simply read the first chapter and then I'd know whether or not I'd like the book. I read the first chapter. Uh oh. I was confused more than awed. But, not one to give up on a book so easily, I put it away and decided to pick it up again when my brain was in the right place.

Two weeks later I am on chapter 18 and...I love it. Ishmael is FUNNY. He is downright silly at times and that's not something usually advertised when Moby Dick comes up in conversation. When Queequeg comes into the picture their relationship is cemented so quickly and sweetly that I was right there with them in bed talking deep into the night. The so-called savage and the open-minded, Presbyterian would-be whaler - who knew such tenderness could develop between them? Ishmael is so respectful and non-judgmental that I wish more people could be like him right now, in the real life of 2010. Of course, I'm only at the beginning - they're not even on the ship yet - I have yet to see how they will change once the plot gets going. But I have a crush on them both right now.

I also downloaded a dictionary for my iPhone that I've been consulting frequently. Not only am I not really (more like not at all) up on my Bible references but there are plenty of wonderful, antiquated words that need defining. Thank goodness for that particular technology. It would be a bit much to carry around Moby Dick and a dictionary on the bus. But I can't get through certain passages without it.

It's going well, this reading of Moby Dick. My mom, an avid reader, was shocked that I voluntarily chose this monstrousest, "ponderous" book, but I'm glad I've got some 527 more pages to look forward to.

In the words of the landlord of the Spouter-Inn, Grub, ho!

Moving Day. Again.

Like most of Allston, Brighton and Brookline, I am moving Sept 1st. This will officially be my 22nd move in my 28 years of life. I think this is pretty common for my generation of misplaced- roaming- nomadic- Gypsy -perpetually-adolesce-ed peers. It's one of our strengths.

I have spent the last few weeks performing a fierce moral inventory of all the things I own. I donated 6 bags of clothing to Rosie's place, because at any time you can find three different sized wardrobes in my closet. I gave my niece and nephews a box of trinketty stuff I once thought was ironic or kitschy.

Then I got to my books. Hundreds.

I am selling a lot of them back to the Used Book Cellar. I am donating some, and keeping the ones that would cause me great trauma to part with. Deciding what that means is the difficult thing. Books aren't just things you read, they are little artifacts that decorate and warm your life. They are loaded guns on your shelf waiting to trigger a series of memories. They are trophies, and guide books, and proof of a life spent in thought, and seeing, and appreciation for ideas--- and the world around you.

Yet- I need to make room for new books, new ideas. I need to send some of my babies to other homes that can give them more attention than I can give them.

If you are moving too, feel free to come by the UBC and sell us your babies. (I mean books no angry letters please.) The buy back times are Wed- Sat 10-4pm. If you want cash, it's 15% of the list price, store credit- you get 20%.

Sigh. Back to packing.

Skippy Dies.

by Paul Murray.
longlisted for the Booker Prize.

It better win.

I am being pulled inexorably through this story of a Catholic boys' school (with all of the wonderful narrative potential that that implies). It is the most thoroughly modern piece of storytelling that I have encountered. This Murray guy has boys pegged, girls pegged, their teachers pegged, their moms and dads pegged, and he has their drugs and their sex pegged, their curiosity and their stifling boredom pegged, and beyond those things, those things that he has control over, he has me nailed to the wall with the most compulsively enjoyable yet chilling book I have read since...I can't remember one like this.

It's the best fictional study of the modern teenager you will read. I want to read it again and I'm not even halfway through. I'm reading these pages, and as a father I find myself hoping that my boy will be something like this character, that my daughter will find her way to not becoming like that one, and that both of them will either avoid or be strong enough to stand up to that one.
And I am thankful I don't have to go through it again, but at the same time I would give anything to go through the chapter I just read.
His first kiss.
Paul Murray is faithful to each and every character in his story. When a writer achieves this level of imagination, compassion, and focus...this book needs to be read.
It's coming into the store soon.

Rain+Coffee+Reading = :)

Splashing boots.  Toes wiggling in wet sandals.  Drenched Gortex rain gear. Mirage of colors resembling umbrellas.  Every other hand enveloped around a coffee...aah!  It feels a lot like the pacific northwest around here.  Those of you who know me will probably know that I often miss the west coast mountains and -- yes I know I'm crazy -- the gray, wet northwest misty weather.  I'll take a week straight of rain over the hot, humid sun any day.

Another thing that reminds me of the northwest corner of the US are independent stores, and Brookline, in this respect, is very much like that.  There are so few chain stores lurking around every corner here (well, until you hit the streets of Boston...).  There's something weird about one-stop shopping.  Sure it's convenient at times, but I don't think you have as many choices nor do you have the benefit of an experienced staff.  Need a game?  Stop by Eureeka, they'll be glad to demo a game for you.  Are you crafty with paper or want to try bookmaking?  The Paper Source is right down the block.  Whether on the go or hanging out, Peet's brews a fabulous cup of coffee -- with or without the fancy extras.  Ice cream?  There are quite a few places that have their own unique flavor and feel -- not to mention the bajillion wonderful restaurants around here.  And, of course, the Booksmith where we aspire to hand you the books that you want, not just the titles that are popular.

As I wandered around Brookline this past week doing various things, I realized that the collage of independent businesses really gives this town a unique appeal.  Imagine if every town was run by chain stores -- the same ones you have in your town, would be the same ones in your grandparents' town, and at the vacation spots you pass through.  Wouldn't seeing the same places -- all around the world -- get boring and repetitive?  I mean at that point, why even go out of town?  Part of the fun of traveling is exploring all the different places and stores.  You learn so much about the town that way!

I think independent and locally owned businesses encourage people to be themselves rather than follow the example of the greedy corporates who only care about your money and world domination.  Okay, maybe that's an overstatement.  Maybe...  But local businesses aren't cookie cutters.  (Did you know that the books at your local chains, like Borders and Barnes and Noble, aren't exactly influenced by the local public?  It's all popularity contests and overplayed marketing schemes.  Their merchandise is ordered in an office somewhere in a different state.  They don't even know their customers.)  Local stores let people explore the community, connect with others, and learn that long forgotten virtue of respect.  There's also that small town feel, where you can slow down and enjoy the moments -- something many frantic people should stop and experience -- in this crazy, fast paced world that we live in!

mockingjay is a beautiful word

It is, and thank you Suzanne Collins for coining it, and for writing the Hunger Games books.

There was a kid, a young man at the door this morning. Lisa and I were at the front of the store, talking about child-rearing and working vacations, and it's a full 50 minutes before our opening time, and this guy is hesitantly shuffling back and forth, kind of back on his heels, and when we realize he has a question I go over and unlock the door, "Hi. uh, yes?" Looking right at me, but perhaps startled at my appearance nonetheless, he softly rattles out that he's here for something, and gestures at the Mockingjay release date sign in the window. "Well, we're not open for another 50 minutes, so..."
"Oh, I know, I'm waiting."

The Harry Potter era, ensconced within the Books are Dead era, which was itself enveloped by the Readers are a Shrinking Minority era, gave the distinct impression that if a book was going to capture the attention of that distracted, medicated, shiftless mass of American children, it had to be HUGE, with MASSIVE PAN-MEDIA potential, and have a MARKETING PLAN that would ensure that there is NOT ONE CHILD LEFT BEHIND once the tsunami of print, television, internet, and radio advertisements wash the record of all other current children's books from their memories.

We decided to sell him the book and once I got one of the registers up I "Psssst''d him in the door and he grinned like maybe you would have grinned at 12 or 13 years old, and you're out in Coolidge Corner before the shops are even open, on your own, and the guy is gonna let you get the book before anyone else, because you showed up. Lisa asked him if he'd been up all night, probably noticing his shaky hands and nervous mumbles, and I didn't catch his response, but after he'd left (and I had locked the front door behind us, and neither of us went before him to let him out, so he's heading for escape with his prize and awkwardly gets pulled up short, pulling and pushing on the locked double doors) she told me that he had wanted to stay up all night, to go to the Children's Bookshop at midnight.

But his mother wouldn't let him.

Bedtime. Homework. Behavior. Consequences. perhaps Health.

Who knows, and one of the best lessons that fatherhood has taught me is that rushing to judge other parents whom you've never met based on what you see happening right now in front of you is a dodgy, dangerous thing to do, and you will almost always be wrong.
So I'm not going there, but where I am going is that the marketing machine has indeed been working on the Hunger Games. But in spite of that, between HP and HG kids have been reading. Other books. It's doable. Kids can and still want to read and be told stories and find stuff out and look at pictures and comic books and be proud to get that book before everybody else, because feeling like you are getting into the new place before anyone else in the world is a special, lasting feeling.

If you have a baby or a pre-school age child, put a book with pictures, any book with pictures, you don't even have to buy one, it could be whatever is on your shelves, a gardening book or a field guide to amphibians, and put it in front of them.
If you have an older child, a "reluctant" reader, as they might be called in the whatever biz, pick up the book you are currently reading and start holding twenty minute reading sessions after dinner at the table. (You are reading something right? If not, you have NO RIGHT TO JUDGE YOUR CHILD'S READING HABITS. This will be good exercise for you, too.) People learn by doing something themselves, or by watching and listening to others. If your kid isn't going to pick up a book, and they don't want to listen to you, then all they have to do is sit there while you read out loud. If you don't see their interest perking by the third week, then go figure out something else.

Don't take anyone else's word for the unique nature of your child.
Allow them to engage in the world on their own terms.
Let them go out at midnight to the bookstore if they really want to.

All day long I'd biddy-biddy-bum....

Paul's last post got me thinking about Fiddler. My brother sings this part of the song whenever we talk about winning the lottery. Which we do...a lot. He actually is quite convincing...and even a little moving when he sings...but what does it mean to "biddy biddy bum"?

For me, Biddy-biddy bum means poetry, and reality television. Today, at the register I thought a lot about dress shopping, AND HOW AWFUL I AM AT IT. Sorry to yell but it's true!

What do I need a dress for ?... (You may be asking yourself?) Well , I am going to sunny- warm Pennsylvania to attend my fella's sister's weddin. Yes, I did consider a pant-suit but I'm not quite ready to give in to the inevitable segregation of my generous thighs.

The point is, when I go on vacation these days it always seems to be for some family party, holiday, event, trial. I look forward to the day when I can peruse our ever expanding magazine collection (that Dana is gardening into quite the selection) and pick out a magazine like this one that the lovely Katie is holding, and read it....without a tinge of irony.

Well, It's getting to be about time for me to buy some spanx knock-off brand supportive undergarments and chap-stick so I can really do it up for this nuptial vacation.

See you at the shelves!